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Blackfoot Physics
A Journey into the Native American Universe

One summer in the 1980s, theoretical physicist F. David Peat went to the Blackfoot Sun Dance ceremony in Alberta, Canada. Hitherto having spent all his life steeped in and influenced by linear Western science, he was entranced by the Native world view and, through dialogue circles between scientists and Native Elders, he began to explore it in greater depth. Blackfoot Physics is the account of his discoveries. In an edifying synthesis of anthropology, history, metaphysics, cosmology and quantum theory, Peat compares the medicines, the myths, the languages, indeed the entire perceptions of reality of two peoples: Western and Indigenous. What becomes apparent is the amazing resemblance between Indigenous teachings and some of the insights that are emerging from modern science, a congruence that is as enlightening about the physical universe as it is about the circular evolution of man's understanding.

To see Chapter 1

 

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Publishing Information

Blackfoot Physics: A Journey into the Native American Universe

Phanes Press
ISBN 1-890482-83-8
$16.95

 

Blackfoot Physics
Paperback Edition, 336 pages
Fourth Estate Limited
May 1996
ISBN 1-85702-456-7
order this edition now

 

 

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Praise for Blackfoot Physics

Featured as "Waterstone Recommends" and Good Book Guide selection

"The modern version of The Tao of Physics...We gain tantalizing glimpses of an elusive alternative to the thing we know as science...Peat's book is an eloquent plea for a fair go for the modes of enquiry of other cultures."
- New Scientist

"Occasionally we find a book that opens the door to some entirely new world. The journey within can be strange and unsettling, yet exhilarating at the same time. We may return home with a far greater understanding of home and ourselves. This was the effect Blackfoot Physics had on me. Opens the door to some entirely new world...a delight. It could make quantum thinkers of us all."
-Danah Zohar, The Independent on Sunday

"What becomes apparent is the amazing resemblance between indigeneous teachings and some of the insights into the structure of the universe that are emerging from modern science."
-Liverpool Daily Post

"Peat invites us to enter into the circle of shared ideas with the indigeneous peoples of Turtle Island. Our effort to understand indigeneous culture are a reflection of our shifting values towards other was of perceiving the world, and are a possible ray of hope between us and the peoples of Turtle Island."
-The Scotsman

"Food for thought for anyone who imagines that modern physics is all about determining the truth about the way the universe works."
-Good Book Guide

"Peat is a faithful and thoughtful guide who has obviously learned much from people he admires and he leaves us at the end of the trail with much food for Fortean thought. Recommended."
-Fortean Times

"Above all, Peat's book is an eloquent plea for a fair go for all modes of enquiry into other cultures."
-New Scientist

"The book is a wonderful example of how and what science should be; an attempt to understand and appreciate, rather than control."
-Waterstones

"I enjoyed this book. It is rich and implicate dancing with such diverse topics as time and number, health and disease, language and realities. It addresses philosophy and metaphysics; space and time; thought and perception; causality, cosmology and healing. I recommend it. It will be going on my book list."
-Mike Money, The Journal

"Its aim is laudable; to expose readers to the breath and intricacy of Indian knowledge. He finds constant parallels between the wisdom of Mohawk, Micmac, Haida and Blackfoot elders and the equally subtle wisdom of a Werner Heisenbeg or a David Bohm."
-Times Literary Supplement

"Blackfoot Physics is full of fascinating information...enough wild material in here to keep most SF fans happy."
-I-D Magazine

 

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Table of Contents:
Chapter 1 - Spirits of Renewal
Chapter 2 - At the Sun Dance: When Paradigms Collide
Chapter 3 - Coming-to-Knowing
Chapter 4 - Stories of Origin
Chapter 5 - The Coming of Disease
Chapter 6 - The Medicine Ways
Chapter 7 - Sacred Mathematics
Chapter 8 - Time, Number and the Mayans
Chapter 9 - Language: The Sacred Vibrations
Chapter 10 - Indigenous Science
Chapter 11 - Realities
Chapter 12 - Conclusions: Turning the Circle

  


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